Welcome to PhiloLogic |
home | the ARTFL project | download | documentation | sample databases | |
Simms, William Gilmore, 1806-1870 [1833], The book of my lady: a melange (Key & Biddle, Philadelphia) [word count] [eaf355]. To look up a word in a dictionary, select the word with your mouse and press 'd' on your keyboard.
The execution of the brave but unfortunate, and perhaps
A voice—a voice of wail. The forest rung With a strange cry of sadness, and a song Of sorrow mixt with triumph. There they come, A thousand warriors of the uncultured wild, Chiefs of the old domain—the solemn waste, Deep woods and waters drear. They gather now, To the performance of a solemn rite, The parting from their homes—their fathers' homes, The graves of the past ages. Yet, no tear, Swells in that sad assemblage—sad, but stern— 'Twere vain and weak to mourn the destiny That tears may not avail, nor plaints avert, Nor moaning lighten. Yet a cause of wo, Not deeper than their parting, yet most deep, Rests in the midst before them. The brave chief, The warrior, and the arrow of their tribe, Swift, strong and terrible, to whom their hearts Were given in homage, and whose eyes had been Their guides and watchers, now, among them lies, Cold and insensible. He will lead no more,
Their arms to battle. He will teach no more Their thoughts in council. He will be no more The father he has been. Well may they wail, For broken is the arrow from their bow, The mighty overthrown, that still o'erthrew, And had no fear of the struggle. All is o'er, And the last song of burial they must yield, The song of death and glory to the brave. Ye warriors who gather, the brave to deplore, And repine for the chief ye shall witness no more, Let the hatchet of fight still unburied remain, Whilst we joy in the glory of him that is slain. Unbounded in soul, as unfearing in fight, Yet mild as the dove when untempted to smite— In battle the tiger, in peace the young fawn, Whose footstep scarce brushes the dew from the lawn. Stood he not in the thick of the battle's array, When their warm blood like rain o'er the smoking grass lay, And the Seminole chiefs from his tomahawk fled, While the best of their warriors before him lay dead? And long did their women in deep sorrow mourn, Looking forth for the braves who could never return— For their scalps the full swell of his legs had embraced, And his women had woven their teeth round his waist. But vain were his triumphs, since now we deplore— Our sorrow begins, for his battles are o'er— His last song was heard on the hills by the day, But at midnight its echoes had faded away. Far down in the valley when evening was still, We heard the deep voice of the wolf on the hill— “And hark!” said the Arrow, when starting to go, “Is not that the screech of Menawé, my foe.
“He comes not, the coward, to mingle in fight, Whilst the red-god stands by and looks down with his light, But in darkness, that emblems his bosom's own hue, He sneaks to perform, what he trembles to do.” The chief took his rifle, and whetted his knife, And went down to see where the wolf was at strife: There came up a clamour of death to the hill, And the echoes return'd it, and then all was still. And the chieftain lay dead in his gore, but his hand Still clung to his knife, tho' it stuck in the sand— They dared not approach him, even dead as he lay, And they bore not the scalp from his forehead away. Let us fling not aside, since the arrow is lost, The bow which we kept at such perilous cost— We can fit a new shaft to its string, when afar, And go with the Sioux and Dog-skin to war. Farther west—farther west! where the buffalo roves, And the red-deer is found in the valley he loves— Our hearts shall be glad in the hunt once again, 'Till the whiteman shall seek for the lands that remain. Farther west—farther west! where the sun, as he dies, Still leaves a deep lustre abroad in the skies— Where the hunter may roam, and his woman may rove, And the whiteman not blight, what he cannot improve. One song, to the home that we leave, of regret— 'Tis the song of a sorrow, but no eye is wet— One song for the hills and the valleys, and one For the arrow now broken, the nation undone. Farther west—farther west! it is meet that we fly, Where the red-deer will bound at the glance of an eye: Yet slowly the song of our parting be sung, For the arrow is broken, the bow is unstrung.
Simms, William Gilmore, 1806-1870 [1833], The book of my lady: a melange (Key & Biddle, Philadelphia) [word count] [eaf355]. |